Masochistic Mommy

After achieving four London 2012 Olympic gold medals – and a world record - Sarah Storey, British para-cyclist, embarked on her biggest adventure yet – motherhood. Sarah, who was born without a left hand, has kindly shared her breastfeeding journey with us, and boy is it epic! From travelling to the Palace whilst heavily pregnant to slotting gruelling training commitments into mammoth breastfeeding sessions, the surreal backdrop to Sarah’s story does not immune her from the common challenges we all share as nursing mothers. “I myself was breastfed for six months (in 1977 babies were allowed to drink cow’s milk at 6 months) and all my friends and family have breastfed. I don't personally see breastfeeding as a choice and everyone I know who was forced to stop has been devastated. I think we need to spread our maternity care more wisely and support mothers to breastfeed more practically because the health implications are far superior for babies who are breastfed the studies clearly...

Pregnancy takes its toll on most mothers – piles, heartburn, water retention, backache – all are par for the course. What you don't expect however, is for pregnancy to deteriorate your bones leaving you so chronically immobile that when your baby arrives, you can’t even carry him. That’s what happened to this mother. Diagnosed with Transient Osteoporosis of the Hip (TOH) during pregnancy, she clung to hopes of breastfeeding despite her health - quite literally - crumbling away. Read on to discover how she coped with the pain, the frustration, and the logistics of nursing a baby through debilitating disease. “Up until 29 weeks my pregnancy progressed without problem, I had mild morning sickness but felt full of energy along the way – even running a marathon at 10 weeks! The pain begins My hips started to hurt so I stopped running and began walking instead for a week or so, until even this became too painful. Hip pain is common during pregnancy but the type of pain I felt, right in t...